I first met Andrei Pliguzov in the fall of 1977 in Leningrad. Hesought me out at the Publichka because he found out I was working on a topiche had worked on as an undergraduate. We struck up a warm friendship duringthat winter. At that time, he was interested in everything, a fact that lentitself to wide-ranging discussions. He was thinking about going into thefield of television in some capacity, either in front of or on the otherside of the camera, but was eventually drawn back to Russian history.

He worked with A. A. Zimin until the latter's death in 1980,then among others, with Viktor Ivanovich Buganov until his death in 1996.In those days, Andrei was a dynamic go-getter with a vibrant personality. Heseemed to be connected with everyone and everything. He published aprodigious amount of high-quality work in a brief period of time. He wasparticularly interested in matters of text criticism and editing andcodicology. His doctoral dissertation "Pamiatniki rannego'nestiazhatel'stva' prevoi treti XVI veka" was completed in 1986. He was oneof the co-editors and major contributor to the collection RUSSKII FEODAL'NYIARKHIV, 5 vols. (1986-1992). He was on the editorial board and contributorto the periodical ARKHIV RUSSKOI ISTORII (1992-), and to variousrotaprint-type publications that made most of the opportunity glasnostprovided for publication outside the old Soviet system of publishing houses.A collection of a number of these early articles of his was published asPOLEMIKA V RUSSKOI TSERKVI: PERVOI TRETI XVI STOLETIIA (Indrik, 2002).Andrei edited ZHIVAIA VODA NEPRIADVY (Molodaia gvardiia, 1988), whichincluded a collection of documents concerning the Kulikovo Battle as well asSergei Borodin's novel about Dmitrii Donskoi. He also co-edited andcontributed to the commentary of the translation of Sigismund vonHerberstein's RERUM MOSCOVITICARUM COMMENTARII into Russian (1988) and acollection of documents and eyewitness accounts about the Smuta(Sovremennik, 1989). He was involved with the translation of John Fennell'sTHE CRISIS OF MEDIEVAL RUSSIA, 1200-1304 into Russian and helped to provideexplanatory notes (1989). In 1993, he published TEKST-KENTAVR O SIBIRSKIKHSAMOEDAKH (Arkeograficheskii tsentr'), a study of folklore narratives aboutSiberia.

After my research year in the Soviet Union, I returned to theUnited States and maintained only sporadic communication with Andrei. Hetook notes for me on a manuscript in the Tikhomirov Collection theNovosibirsk (his hometown) Public Library. In January 1990, I was able tovisit the Novosibirsk Public Library to examine the manuscript myself. Thedirector of the Sector of Rare Books and Manuscripts, Vladimir NikolaevichAlekseev, in the initial interview to allow me access to the manuscript,quite naturally wanted to know why I wanted to see it. I began to go into along explanation about my dissertation on the 1503 Church Council when henoticed among my papers the notes that Andrei had taken. He recognizedAndrei's handwriting and straight away brought me the manuscript.

I was hoping to see Andrei that trip but had just missed him inMoscow where I had been earlier in the week. The next day VladimirNikolaevich came over to the desk where I was working and said that I had aphone call from Moscow. It was Andrei. He told me he was getting on a planeand would be there in 5 hours, and that I should wait at the Library forhim. Sure enough, he arrived just as the library was closing. Such deedswere typical for Andrei in those days. He managed to include an article ofmine, an offprint of which I gave him on the steps of the Library, in anarticle of his that was already in press. He was an inclusive scholar. Atthe time, I thought of him as a young Zimin or Ia. S. Lur'e, and certainly aworthy successor to these two giants.

In the 1990s, Andrei spent some time at Harvard University andsaw as one of his primary missions to help Western scholars who were not asfamiliar with the Russian manuscript repositories and scholarly writing ashe was. He was unstinting in his willingness to assist others. Edward L.Keenan took Andrei under his wing and made sure Andrei had sufficientemployment to keep him going. Andrei also worked closely with OmeljanPritsak. Eventually Andrei began to work for the Library of Congress underJames Billington. During his time at Harvard he helped organize and co-edita Festschrift for Keenan

At the 1994 AAASS convention in Philadelphia he was on a panel Iwas also on and he gave a flawless presentation in English without notes!But by then he had already been diagnosed with a brain tumor. The subsequentoperation changed his personality and his abilities. Previously he was asure-footed scholar, in command of his intellectual domain; subsequently hebegan to stumble in his prodigious memory, making miscues that clearlymystified him. In 1999, both of us were at the AAASS convention in St.Louis. We spent part of a day together going to Cahokia Mounds, the site ofthe major city of the Mississippian Indians. Although he enjoyed the trip,Andrei was, by then, hesitant and unsure of himself. He tired easily and wasnow the one who required assistance. His decline continued slowly butsteadily thereafter. Before long, he was having trouble expressing completethoughts even in Russian, as though searching for things that were no longerthere.

Yet he continued to work, even after returning to Russia. He wasone of the editors of SOCHINENIIA. KNIGA GLAGOLEMIIA FOTIOS (Indrik, 2005).He had completed preparation of a volume of metropolitan documents, soon tobe published by the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. He wrote andpublished a volume of poetry. The last I heard from him was about a year agoconcerning an article he had just written. Andrei was a friend and a scholarto the last.